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Anyone can grab a random gift book from the bestseller shelf at the front of the bookstore. But serious readers will appreciate titles that say "I get you" instead of "This was the first book I saw, and I got 50 percent off." Here's a sampling of the season's top titles. Eat, drink and be merryBeyond Nose to Tail by Fergus Henderson and Justin Piers GellatlyBloomsbury | List: $35buy it nowTangy Tart Hot & Sweet: A World of Recipes for Every Day by Padma LakshmiWeinstein Books | List: $34.95buy it nowWhisky Tales by Charles MacLeanLittle Books | List: $19.95buy it now
Picture pagesMarilyn Monroe: A Life in Pictures edited by Anne VerlhacChronicle BooksBooks | List: $40.99buy it nowReflections by Guido ArgentiniteNeues | List: $95.00buy it nowMy Last Supper: 50 Great Chefs and their Final Meals by Melanie DuneaBloomsbury | List: $39.95buy it now
Gift graphicThe Complete Persepolis by Marjane SatrapiPantheon | List: $24.95buy it nowLust: Kinky Online Personal Ads from Seattle's "The Stranger" adopted by Ellen ForneyFantagraphics Books | List: $14.95buy it nowHeroes: Volume One by Various and Tim SaleDC Comics | List: $29.99buy it now
Stocking stuffersNaughty or Nice?: Christmas Erotica Stories edited by Alison TylerCleis Press | List: $14.95buy it nowGobshite Wisdom: Curse and Berate in 69+ Languages edited by R.V. BranhamSoft Skull Press | List: $13.95buy it nowOn the Road: The Original Scroll by Jack KerouacViking | List: $25.95buy it now
For Playboy loversPlayboy Cover to Cover: The '50s Digital CollectionList: $100buy it nowPlayboy: The Complete CenterfoldsList: $500buy it now2008 The Girls Next Door CalendarList: $15.99buy it now
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Beyond Nose to Tail is not for the faint-of-palate; wrap this up for the oxe-tongue lover on your list. Top Chef hottie-host Padma Lakshmi's Tangy Tart Hot & Sweet cookbook features sophisticated-but-easy recipes for crab cakes, calamari, fried chicken and curry dishes. No scotch whiskey drinker should be without Whisky Tales; even the uninitiated will succumb to the spirit after getting the low-down on the heady drink.
Anne Verlhac compiles an intimate photo-timeline of Playboy's first Sweetheart of the Month in Marilyn Monroe: A Life in Pictures. Guido Argentini's Reflections challenges our perception of reality using sensuality; the cover model is Playboy Cyber Girl Thea. Superstar chefs Anthony Bourdain, Nobu, Alain Ducasse and others appear in revealing portraits alongside their recipes and choices for final meals in My Last Supper.
Read the gripping tale of Marjane Satrapi's life as a girl growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution and her teen years far from home in Vienna in The Complete Persepolis; the upcoming movie took home the 2007 Grand Jury Prize from the Cannes Film Festival. Ellen Forney illustrates The Stranger's "Lustlab" personal classifieds in Lust, with an intro by Dan Savage. See what happened between episodes of Heroes in DC's companion to the hit show.
No night before Christmas is complete without reading from holiday erotica collection Naughty or Nice? Bone up on profanity's roots with Gobshite Wisdom and be the best insult-thrower at the holiday table. Beat-junkies deserve the scroll-edition of On the Road, Jack Kerouac's original version of the classic.
Exclusive digital collection Playboy Cover to Cover offers access to every 1950s issue exactly how it first appeared in print; package contains one DVD-ROM disk, a 200-page companion book and a reprint of the very first issue of Playboy. The Complete Centerfolds gathers together more than 600 Playmate Centerfolds, reproduced exactly as they appeared in the magazine, in one luxurious, full-size collector's volume. The sexy pictures in the 2008 The Girls Next Door 16-month calendar reveal much more than Hef's girlfriends' bodily charms.